The weather was warm for the first week in March, with a wet wind blowing hard down the length of Pennsylvania Avenue. They could have hailed a passing hackney, but the hotel was visible from the front steps of the legate’s manor. Serafina’s parents followed behind Falconer, speaking in low, terse fragments. She knew they were worried about her. They had remained uncertain about how to treat her ever since she had joined them in Washington. She knew the relationship had changed dramatically and would never go back to the way it had been. Though it pained her immensely to see their attitude toward Falconer, the only way she knew to improve matters was to be a dutiful daughter. But she was no longer a child. And what was more important, her parents knew this. They had seen the measure of her willful nature, the lengths to which she could be driven by passion and supposed love. They feared causing her to break away once more. They had yet to understand the profound changes that had come about during her time away from them.
